Woman: Ex charged with murdering her family was ‘eerie calm’

Nov. 21, 2011

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 1:17 p.m.

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Vitaliy Krasnoperov, 26, waits for court to begin in Santa Ana on Thursday. He is charged with murder plus special circumstances for his role in the May 21, 2007, slayings of Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and Karishma Dhanak, 20. He is being tried with Charles Anthony Murphy Jr., 26. PAUL BERSEBACH, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Charles Anthony Murphy Jr., 26, is taken out of court in Santa Ana on Thursday. He is charged with murder plus special circumstances for his role in the May 21, 2007, slayings of Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and Karishma Dhanak, 20. He is being tried with co-defendant Vitaliy Krasnoperov, 25. PAUL BERSEBACH, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Senior Deputy District Attorney Howard Gundy gives his opening statements in Santa Ana on Thursday. Charles Anthony Murphy Jr., 26, and Vitaliy Krasnoperov, 25 are charged with murder plus special circumstances for their role in the May 21, 2007, slayings of Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and Karishma Dhanak, 20. PAUL BERSEBACH, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Charles Anthony Murphy Jr., 26, and co-defendant Vitaliy Krasnoperov, 26, from left, listen to opening statements during their trial in Santa Ana on Thursday. They are charged with murder plus special circumstances for their roles in the May 21, 2007, slayings of Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and Karishma Dhanak, 20. PAUL BERSEBACH, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Undated DMV photo of Jayprakash Dhanak. Jaypraykash and Karishma Dhanak were taken by assailants to a bike trail at Mason Regional Park in Irvine where they were killed and their bodies set on fire.

Iftekhar Murtaza and Shayona Dhanak are pictured together in this undated handout photo.

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The murder trials of Vitaliy Krasnoperov, left, and Charles Anthony Murphy Jr., right, began Thursday. The two are men charged with conspiring with a Van Nuys man to kidnap and murder his ex-girlfriend's father and sister in a horrific case in which the victims' bodies were set on fire in May 2007. FILE: MARK RIGHTMIRE, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

Vitaliy Krasnoperov, 26, waits for court to begin in Santa Ana on Thursday. He is charged with murder plus special circumstances for his role in the May 21, 2007, slayings of Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and Karishma Dhanak, 20. He is being tried with Charles Anthony Murphy Jr., 26.PAUL BERSEBACH, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

SANTA ANA – A woman testified Monday that the man charged with beating, stabbing and setting her father and sister's bodies on fire displayed an "eerie calm" when she broke up with him a couple of months before the killings.

She explained to jurors that her parents are devout Hindus, while Murtaza was a non-practicing Muslim. That was among the reasons their relationship would not work out, Dhanak said she told Murtaza.

Murtaza, she said, reacted uncharacteristically calmly the night of March 28, 2007, when she broke up with him. She said she had known him to be explosive and manipulative.

She testified that she put her heart into finally ending a 2½-year, up-and-down relationship, even returning a cellphone that Murtaza had given her so she could clandestinely call him without her family knowing.

"He was just really creepy calm," Dhanak, then 18 years old and a UC Irvine freshman, testified at the trial of two men accused of conspiring to help Murtaza commit the May 21, 2007, slayings of Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and Karishma Dhanak, 20.

Co-defendants Vitaliy Krasnoperov of Hollywood and Charles Anthony Murphy Jr. of Mission Hills, both 26, are charged with murder and attempted murder, plus special circumstances for their roles in the killings.

The victims were abducted from their home, beaten and stabbed, and their bodies set on fire.

Anaheim firefighters found Shayona Dhanak's mother, Leela Dhanak, unconscious on a neighbor's lawn when they responded to a report that the Dhanaks' Anaheim Hills home was engulfed in flames. Leela Dhanak had been beaten and her throat slashed, but she survived the attack.

Shayona Dhanak told jurors that Krasnoperov and Murphy were two of three friends Murtaza, 26, had asked her to set up with dates with her friends. She said she met Krasnoperov but never met Murphy.

If convicted, Krasnoperov and Murphy face potential sentences of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Murtaza is scheduled for trial on similar charges next year. He faces a possible death sentence if convicted.

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